For Haitian-American Doctors, a Call to Return.

In a nice article featuring, Marie Dominique Toussaint who traveled with AMHE and worked at the State University Hospital in Port-au-Prince, New York times reporter Anne Barnard titled her piece: for Haitian-Americans, a call to return. And she simply wrote.
“Ms. Toussaint is among those ambivalent volunteers. After a frantic struggle to find a way to volunteer — and several false starts when large relief organizations did not return her calls — she traveled south with a team of doctors and nurses from the Association of Haitian Physicians Abroad, known by its French acronym, A.M.H.E., and paramedics from the Bedford-Stuyvesant Volunteer Ambulance Corps. A pediatric nurse used to working with sophisticated neonatal intensive-care equipment at Harlem Hospital Center, she found herself in the ruins of Haiti’s general university hospital, trying to treat children with crushed limbs and breathing trouble, but lacking adequate anesthetics, sterile equipment or clear lines of hospital authority.”
“The Haitian government has tracked at least 1,400 Haitian Diaspora professionals, mostly in medical fields, who have cycled through the country since the quake. The Association of Haitian Physicians Abroad, just one of many Haitian-American medical groups volunteering, has sent more than 500 volunteers.” End of quotation.
 
You may read the full article by clicking
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/05/nyregion/05nychaiti.html  
 
The AMHE has established its headquarters at the General Hospital and will be there indefinitely. This is not a one
shot deal. A sustained commitment is really necessary to make a difference.
 
Among the 500 +plus medical personnel who have traveled with AMHE, time has come to return. We urge everyone
to go to our web site www.amhe.org and volunteer to make the trip again in much better conditions than the early days. There is no need to flight to Dominican Republic and spend 10 hours on a bus. We directly travel to Port-au-Prince. If you are already registered, we do have your demographics, just indicate the week or the preferably the two weeks you want to pledge for rebuilding a new HAITI.
For those who have not yet volunteer, we understand your feelings, just access the AMHE website and fill the form.
For more information
pnacier@aol.com, eljerome@pol.net, ymanigat@aol.com

Month of April 2010 at HUEH
Dr Vladimir Berthaud is the Team leader of an AMHE group which will work at HUEH, the General Hospital from 5 to
the 10 of Avril. Vladimir will primarily station at the AMHE-HUEH HIV and tuberculosis tents. He is assisted by
another Infectious Diseases specialist Dr. Andrew Desruisseau. Other volunteers are Dr. Ravi Hirekatur, Family
physician, Dr. Henry Young, Director of residency program in Dentistry. Two nurses specialized in emergency
medicine Leslie Reasoner et Vickie Sellers have accompanied the group.
A group of Physicians from ARUBA will return and travel under AMHE from 11 to 17 of April 2010.
Team leaders Dr Alix Dufresne and Dr Frances Schmidt will be at the General Hospital from the 19 to the 25th. They
plan to be in Jacmel prior coming to HUEH. They want to bring with them supplies : antibiotics, anti hypertensive
medications etc.
Others AMHE volunteers will arrive after the 25 to cover the rest of the month.